Diane Coyle - A Young* Economists' Dinner Discussion

Held on Tuesday, May 30

With support from Ruffer LLP

Speakers

Diane Coyle (University of Manchester)

Agenda

Diane Coyle is one of my heroes – one of the few academic economists in this country (PhD Harvard) who can actually write about economics in a manner that is both rigorous and accessible. I particularly liked her 2007 book on contemporary economics, The Soulful Science, but she was also way ahead of the curve with The Weightless World (1997), The Economics of Enough (2011) and GDP: A Brief but Affectionate History.

Diane is currently a Professor of Economics at Manchester – but she is not just an economist. She is also a consultant (founder of Enlightenment Economics), and was previously a journalist (a former European editor of Investors Chronicle and economics editor of The Independent), a regulator (a former member of the Competition Commission), and a media big-shot (Vice-Chairman of the BBC Trust from 2010 to 2015). It may not be entirely relevant, but she is also married to the BBC’s tech guru, Rory Cellan-Jones.

Her current work at Manchester (and as a researcher at the new Economic Statistics Centre of Excellence) focuses on economic measurement, and the problems therein. But she is also involved with the Natural Capital Committee and in the past was a member of the Migration Advisory Committee.

All this, and she didn’t go to St. Paul’s Girls’ School… Indeed, she grew up in Bury, Lancs. – though she did do the standard PPE thing before heading to the US. Diane is good news, and as close to a polymath as contemporary British economics has produced.

If you (or a friend/colleague) would like to join us for what I am sure will be a lively discussion, please let us know by emailing alex@csfi.org or by calling the Centre at 0207 621 1056. Thanks to the hospitality of our friends at Ruffer, I can promise an excellent dinner as well.

Sincerely yours,

Andrew HiltonDirectorCSFI

*PS: To recap the rules: Our “Young Economists” series is aimed at “young” economists/strategists/analysts – anyone, really, who can read Martin Wolf’s columns without crying, laughing or fainting. “Young” is also subjective. Our cut-off is usually 40 (which I realise is not young, except to me); but we are flexible.